Whale watching in Santa Barbara

It’s a bizarre yet wondrous sight: a 40-foot humpback whale holding position only a few feet beside a 75-foot catamaran.The whale’s radiant white pectoral fins are spread like wings. Its massive body rolls gently as this great leviathan casts a curious glance toward its gawking admirers.It’s one of two ‘friendlies’ providing passengers aboard the Condor Express with encounters so close they can hardly believe their eyes.These are lively times in the Santa Barbara Channel. Vast blooms of krill and nutrient-rich waters teeming with bait fish have attracted dozens of mammalian species, including humpback and blue whales.The high-speed Condor Express -- the only vessel making daily forays deep into the channel -- can reach the feeding grounds in less than an hour.Several minutes pass before a large splash in the distance. Soon the vessel is alongside two humpbacks. Passengers crowd the rails and camera shutters click.’I finally have proof!’ shouts a gleeful Jeffrey Mummey, 11, from Heath, Ohio, explaining that his cousin Nick, who is not aboard, ‘never believes me when I tell him stuff.’